The Portland daily press., 1887-12-10
THROUGH MAINE FORESTS.
Difficult Railroad Building In the
WiIds of Northern Maine.
How the Work on the Canadian
Pacific Has Progressed.
A Line of Deep and Long icuts and
Mammoth iron Tresties.
Especial to the Press.1

Pacific In Maine was getting fairly under
way. the engineers here were of the opinion
that by November or December the iron
would be laid as far as Greenville, and that
trains from the West could run into Bangor
via Greenville. All summer long and all the
fall the work has been pushed with great
energy. There have at times been three
thousand men at work on the line. The num-
Der has been above two thousand most Of
the time. By night as well Gas by day the
work has gone on. Swarthy Italians work
ing in deep cuts by the light reflected from
huge headlights have appeared to the few
! who have penetrated into the deep woods
more like evil spirits Of darkness than any
other spectacle ever seen in the Maine
woods. Yet in spite of all the haste made
| by day and night both, the Canadian Pacific
cars have not reached Greenville, have not
| come within sight of Moosehead Lake; and
will not probably, reach even Moose River
village. which is less than thirty miles from
the point ON the western border of Maine
where the Canadian Pacific enters our State.
OF the one hundred and thirty or forty miles
of track to be laid between the western bor-
der and Mattawamkeag only about twenty
miles are down, and five miles more, which
will bring the end of the track to Attean
Pond within five or six miles Of Moose River
village, are as lmuch as will be completed
this season. Along the rest of the lline, ex-
cept perhaps on portions of the Mattawam-
keag Division, where the work has been
more nearly completed than ION other parts
of the line, operations will be Icarried on all
winter.
The principal reasons for this miscarriage
of plans are two. In the first place the work
has been very much harder than was ex-
pected sand in the second place the best
labor which the contractors have been able
to get has been very poor, mostly Italians,
and riff-raff picked up in great cities. Few
railroads have been built in this region in
recent years, and the skilled labor which the
enterprise of the West keeps in training has
been sadly missed here. But more discour-
aging even than the bad quality of the labor
has been the hardness of the work. The
earth that has been removed has much Of it
been of the hardest kind. The "hard pan"
lies very near the surface of the ground up
in these regions. Fine earth with stones
large and small packed SO closely that pick
could not penetrate confronted the contrac-
tors in some places; in others
gravel cemented into a mass defied
pickmen. Over nearly the entire length
of the line one or the other OF these
hard conditions prevailed. The only way to
remove this hard pan was to blast it out, a
slow and costly method Quicksands were
also encountered. When the time came on
1. IoI g., kho Of
the work. the contractors could not come to
time. A few of the sub-contractors even
went under, borne down by the unexpected
costs. There was talk that even the princi-
pal contractors would throw up their con-
tracts. But the Canadian Pacific Company
came to their rescue, offering a percentage
extra for the hard earth, while nothing has
been said about the overrunning of the time
of the contracts On these terms it is not
probable that the contractors will make
much; the impression seems to prevail that
they will be lucky if they get out of their
Maine job without loss. About all of them
have done contract work for the Canadian
Pacific from the North Shore of Lake Su-
perior to Puget Sound, and when they de-
clare that the region in which they are now
working is tough country" the assertion
has all the impressiveness of the declaration
that is backed by extensive experience.
If you 80 into the offices of the engineers
here at Greenvile, they will show you long
wavy line. at places breaking into sharp and
abrupt points. This line is the "profle,"
and it represents hills, valleys, gullies and
undulations along the line of the road from
the western boundary to Mattawamkeag.
Along this long wavy line are patches of
color extending from the wavy line up or
down to the line representing the level on
which the track is to be laid. These patches
of color represent the excavations and fill
ings that have been made. So glance at
the profile map shows the progress that has
been made. Except the twenty miles of
track laid on the west the grading has not
been completed on any long stretch of the
line. Over on the Mattawamkeag division,
on the contracts of Angus Sinclair and Cor
don, for twenty-three miles west of the juno
ture with the Maine Central. the grading is
almost all done, ready for track laying. But
excepting this, the engineers profles show
the work completed in no one place of any
great length. By the present methods of rail-
road building work is carried on along the
whole line simultaneously. SO on the profile
are little patches of color alternating with
open spaces where work is yet to be done, a
cut to be made or ravine or depression to
be filed. At the present time, on the whole
line about two-thirds of the work of prepar-
ing for track laying has been done. During
the summer and fall the higher grading along
the longer stretches was done, leaving the
deep cuts and deep "flls" for this winters
work.
A large number Of bridges and trestles, in
fact all the principal ones along the iline re-
main to be put in. Beginning on the west
ern and, near Attean Pond, which will prob
ably be the terminus of the track laid this
fall, the first bridge is at Moose River, about
half dozen miles east This bridge, which
is all complete is of wood, and two hundred
and fifty feet long. With few exceptions
the bridges now put in will be OF wood
This Is not because the managers of the
Canadian Pacific think wood better or so
good as iron, but because wooden bridges
are erected so much more easily and cheap
ly. They will eyentuallyEbe replaced by
iron. With this bridge at Moose river all
completed track laying might go on were it
not for heavy rock cut a short distance
westward. Night ard day all summer they
have been digging through the solid ledge.
The bridge at Moose river is a truss bridge
built of first quality timber. Exclusive of
masonary it cost the company probably ten
or fifteen thousand dollars.
Going east from Moose river there is to be
constructed pile trestle half a mile long at
Parlin stream. At Misery stream there is to
be an iron girder bridge of one span seventy
feet long and with first class masonry. AT
the West Outlet of Moosehead lake there
will be another one-span bridge of about
the same length. At the East Outlet, over
the Kennebec river a large wooden truss
bridge is to be put in. 1t will be of two or
three spans. This bridge like all the others
that are to be put across driving streams,
will be Of sufficient length of span. the en-
gineers give assurance to offer no serious
impediments to the logs that float under. At
Misery Stream and West Outlet the spans
are to be from shore to shore. At Greenville
there will be large bridge over the Bangor
and Piscataquis, five or six hundred feet
long. The main span over the track will be
of iron, the remainder Of wooden trestling.
East of Greenville comes the region of the
great iron trestles. Along Wilson stream,
where the country is very rough, there must
be put in great iron trestle, 115 feet high
in some places, and nearly thousand feet
long. The cost of this great trestle will
probably be 500, 900 at least. There is moth
ing like it in the State of Maine but there
will be another little further east in this
same region, that will be longer. From Will
con etream m Shin Pond Istream there are to